Weekend - 週末 – zhōu mò
I love weekends! Especially weekends during the summer season. The days are much longer and the weather is warm, it allows me to spend lots of outdoor time with the family. In our family, we also like to take little weekend trips to just get away. Recently, we went up to the Berkshires with some friends and took the kids bike riding. It was so much fun we hope to do it again soon.
壽 – longevity – shòu
Chopsticks turns 6 today, I can’t believe he is 6 already. I want to keep him in a time capsule, so he will never grow old. I remember writing the words of the week Happy Birthday for Dumpling’s birthday, so just to be fair, I should do one for Chopsticks too.
It is considered most fortunate to live a long life, so the symbol 壽 is often found in many decorations throughout a typical Chinese household. Longevity noodles are usually served at dinners on birthday celebrations, or during Chinese New Year. Traditionally, longevity noodles are made with a single lump of dough. The dough is stretched, then folded and stretched again until each fold creates thin threads of noodles. The process will not be finished until there are a thousand strands of noodles.
When you get a chance to enjoy it, try not to break off the noodle you are picking up, since it is believed that the longer the noodle is, the longer it suggests your life will be.
I will not be making longevity noodles for my 6 year old birthday boy tonight. He wants to go out for sushi! Oh well, I will make him spaghetti for lunch instead then.
Pollen – 花粉 – huā fěn
Loving this weather, we hit 80 today here in the Northeast. Everything is waking up, including the all the pollen in the air. My two poor kids have been on medications on 2 weeks now. Little Dumpling got his first asthma attack of this season, felt so bad for him.
Chinese words are always so funny. Some can be so poetic and descriptive, yet some can just be so straight forward. Pollen, for example, is pretty straight forward. The word 花 means flower, and 粉 means powder. Yup, that’s it, Flower Powder! Where as you have words like 花都, Huā dū, literal translation is Flower city. It actually describes a city full of beautiful things, just like flowers. How pretty is that!!!
Spring – 春天 – chūn tiān
The temperature is rising, and Spring is finally here!
Lantern Festival – 元宵節 – Yuán xiāo jié
Lantern Festival or 元宵節 is celebrated on the 15th day of the first month in the lunar calendar. This is not to be confused with Moon Festival, which is celebrated on the 15th day of the eighth month in the lunar calendar. Traditioanlly, 元宵節 marks the end of the Chinese New Year celebration as it’s the first full moon of the new year. Once again, families gather together for one last time before returning to work and “normal” life. During the gathering, everyone is to enjoy some 湯圓, tāng yuán, made out of glutinous rice. As you have seen from our previous posts, Chinese people believe in symbolic food, the circular shape of the tang yuan reminds family members to stay together and be united. So don’t forget to eat your tang yuan on 2/28 this year!
Happy New Year Everyone!
We took a week off, following the traditions and to fight all the evil spirits and not wanting to bring any bad luck. Right! Actually, kids were off last week, and combined with all the snow and Chinese New Year celebrations, we were too exhausted to blog. 
During the week off, I ate a lot of gāo. The literally translation is cake, but most gāo that I ate was not the sweet ones that most people are accustomed to. Chinese people eat these gāo a lot during Chinese New Year. The word cake, or gāo, sounds the same as the word “High” or 高. Therefore, eating a lot of gāo has a symbolic meaning of raising oneself higher.
Some of the 糕 gāo our family likes to eat during Chinese New Year are:
Radish Cake – 蘿蔔糕 – This is not a sweet kind of cake, and a lot of dim sum places have them on a regular basis too. It is delicious and it is usually cut into rectangular pieces and pan fried before serving. My boys love them! I found this recipe from Tasty Treats, check it out.
make the Cantonese version, which is sweetened with brown sugar. It is also pan fried before serving. My Dad makes a really good one, I will have to make sure I put that into my family recipe blog.Good Fortune – 福 – fú
The Fú Character may be one of the most popular Chinese New Year symbols for modern Chinese people. The Chinese character Fú means fortune.
It can be posted either in normal position or upside down like in the above picture. Why post it upside down? In Chinese language, the character “upside down” is pronounced exactly the same as the character “arrive”. So this is a homophone rhetoric to mean “Fortune arrives”.
Reunion Dinner – 團圓飯 – tuán yuán fan
This literally means “Reunion Rice”, it is the big dinner Chinese people eat on New Year’s Eve. It is considered one of the most important events for Chinese New Year. It is translated as Reunion Meal, as all the family members would make a special effort to make this dinner, so that the family is once again united before the New Year. It is a symbol of strength and unity of the family.
As mentioned from my previous post, I have a big family. Even now that I am married, I still make a point to go back to my parent’s house for this dinner. This becomes a juggling art, as we will also need to have dinner with my in-laws as well. We will usually have an extra early dinner with my in-laws, then head to my parent’s house for a second meal, and then a sleepover. This is definitely the beauty and the difficulty of having all family members relatively close by. I am sure this doesn’t sound all that unfamiliar with most of you, as Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners are probably handled in a similar manner. It’s crazy, but it is all good time.
Red Envelope – 紅包 – hóng bāo
紅包 is the quintessential item for any Chinese New Year celebration. 紅包 is a small little red envelope, decorated with good luck Chinese characters or symbols. It is used to place money and given out to kids. Traditionally, married adults will give 紅包 to all the kids that great them on the New Year. There are many differnt kinds of red envelopes these days, so you can really have a lot of fun picking out the best one. This design is cute for the kids and a little more contempary, it also has the tiger, so perfect for the new year.
